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Prefer Anon

I very much appreciate the information that is on this site, it has helped me immensely. I have come late to hunting and I had no childhood guidance on the matter, so this has been a great resource. I chose to hunt because I feel that I should take full responsibility for what I eat, and I haven't had mammal in a dozen years because of this (many consider goofy) rule.

I took a Blacktail in NW Washington State today. One shot and he dropped, though I did hurry over and do a mercy shot to the head just in case it wasn't quickly fatal.

Rifle: CZ 557 in 6.5x55 Swedish Mauser.
Handload data:
Powder: Hodgdon H4831sc, 43.2 gr
Bullet: Hornaday 140 grn SST
Case: Federal
Primer: Winchester Standard Large Rifle
BTOL: 59.60 mm
Velocity 10 ft from muzzle: 2450

This was the fasted load I could make that would shoot under a MOA at 100 yds. Once I picked the load, I practiced on the bench and then from practical real world positions. After I settled on this load, and too late to redo it for hunting season, I bought a chronograph and found out it was pretty slow.

I took your advice about shooting for the autonomic plexis outlined in this article because I figured I wasn't going to get any hydrostatic shock effect: http://www.ballisticstudies.com/Knowledgebase/Effective+Game+Killing.html The deer was standing almost exactly like the deer-like animal with a crosshair diagram in that article - maybe the head was pointed toward my position a little more.

This was actually the second deer I had a chance at. I chose not to shoot the first one for reasons I'm still trying to sort out in my head. He and I spent about 30 minutes looking at each other, the last ten at about a 50 ft apart. At one point he even stomped his foot and huffed at me. Most of the time he just kept coming toward me while eating thimbleberry leaves -- he knew I was there, I didn't surprise him in any way to get that close. He just walked right up. I took a bunch of pictures, even with the flash and he didn't care. Anyway, maybe I watched too long -- I just didn't feel like I wanted to shoot him.

Here is a picture of the one I did not shoot:



The second deer I had a shot at, I did shoot, without hesitation once I had a nice clean line of site (probably because in the ensuing two weeks I've been humping all over the mountainside seeing nothing at all). He was about 100 yds distant. He's a small deer with just two prongs, but I'm fairly glad about that -- he was heavy and bulky enough that I had to go get help to get him to my vehicle.

Entrance wound:


I looked inside to find the bullet, but all I could find was a about 3 finger widths filled with crumbs and what appeared to be vertebral splinters forward of the heart. The heart and lungs were untouched. There was no exit wound. I have the gutted deer hanging and tomorrow plan to butcher it -- maybe I will find something then.